Fred Tomaselli - Contemporary Art Part II New York Friday, November 14, 2008 | Phillips

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  • Provenance


    Christopher Grimes Gallery, Santa Monica

  • Exhibited


    Santa Monica, Christopher Grimes Gallery, Fred Tomaselli, 1998; Palm Beach, The Palm Beach Institute of Contemporary Art, Fred Tomaselli: Ten Year Survey, December 10, 2001-March 3, 2002; Santa Fe, SITE Santa Fe, March 16-May 2, 2002; Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, The Cranbrook Art Museum, Transfigurations: The Body in 20th Century Art, September 20-November 30, 2003

  • Literature


    A. Tager and D. A. Greene, Fred Tomaselli, Santa Monica, 1995, n.p. (illustrated); A. Cappellazzo, ed., Fred Tomaselli: Ten Year Survey, Palm Beach, 2001, n.p., (illustrated)

  • Catalogue Essay

    The subject matter of Exploded Version provides a particularly apt vehicle for the artist Fred Tomaselli:  viewers are presented with a human head comprised entirely of the pharmaceuticals which have been his most celebrated media.  Typically understood as invisible agents of change, activated only within the physical bounds of the mind and body, the drugs in this case make up the entire visual substance of the work, delicately suspended in a lustrous pane of acrylic and resin.  Unlike many of Tomaselli's other resin works, which frequently incoporate cut paper and the leaves of plants, the present lot is a pure expression of the most artist's most central intentions, "...to seduce and transport the viewer into the space of these pictures while simultaneously revealing the mechanics of that seduction."  (Fred Tomaselli, as quoted in Fred Tomaselli: Monsters of Paradise, Ediburgh, 2004, p. 43)    

131

Exploded Version

1993
Acrylic, resin, aspirin, antacid, acetaminophen, ephedrine and saccharin pills on panel.
47 1/2 x 47 1/2 in. (120.7 x 120.7 cm).
Signed, titled and dated "Fred Tomaselli 'Exploded Version' 1993" on the reverse. 

Estimate
$150,000 - 200,000 

Sold for $170,500

Contemporary Art Part II

14 Nov 2008, 10am & 2pm
New York